estdeus_innobis | Entries tagged with valmont

hermia-sophia.livejournal.com

Everyone says that it is easier the second time around. And it is, I suppose, for I already know what to expect. And it was briefer, for which I am grateful to all the gods!

And safe and healthy, for Nu was watching over me. Her calm voice, her soothing ripple of words, her kind hands - and, of course, the magical aid that she gave. I knew more certainly than I ever did with Luc, that I would be safe and so would the baby.

But there is no amount of preparation that can make it easier when you are handed a tiny human being, and told that you are responsible for everything. Feeding, cleaning, teaching. Turning them into a good person - that is your job. Making thousands upon thousands of choices that will shape them, choices that will cause joy or grief or fear or reassurance to a person who depends upon you utterly.

That is never easy. But oh, it is sweet.

As Nu steps out, I lie back against the pillows, my arms wrapped around the little bundle of blankets and warmth, and feel the joy seep through me as I hold my daughter.

Our daughter.

[Open to Valmont]

hermia-sophia.livejournal.com

Thursday, June 14
Valmont and Hermia's Garden

Well. This is going to be awkward.

But a bit of awkwardness is well worth the trouble, and worth the greater good if we can turn Mab aside from the path that she is on. If we can win her back to the path that I know she wants to follow, but has gone astray. This person who delights in violence and bloodshed - that is not my friend. Not the person who took me in when I first stumbled into this town; not the person performed my wedding.

If there is any chance that I can possibly call Mab back to herself, I must do it.

And, in truth, I should have done it long ago.

So we are setting out tea and cakes and lemonade in the garden, and sending Luc up for his nap a bit early so that he will be out of the way.

(Well, more precisely, we are sending him up to his room. Whether he will sleep is another question entirely. More likely, we will come up to find a very awake littleboy amid a maze of pillows and blocks and a long elaborate story about what it is. But at least he will not be here.)

I waddle about the table (dear gods, I did not think I could get any larger, but apparently, I can!), setting napkins and silverware in their proper places while Valmont fetches the food. And the wheels of my mind spin, and I wait.

[Open to Valmont and Mab]

hermia-sophia.livejournal.com

Friday, June 1
Day 1461
The garden behind the Whitechapel

I think that today I will stay in the garden. The sun is shining, and I can sit on the chaise longue with my shoes off and my feet up, and I have all of the books that I need with me - and the notebook for my project with Alice, too. I shall have to speak with her about that when she returns from work.

Luc doesn't seem to mind staying at home as long as he can still run about. He has decided that he must pick one of every kind of plant and flower to bring to me, and he has lined them all up in a neat row along the edge of my chair. Why? I have already learned not to ask, even though Luc would happily tell me at great length, just as he tells me long chattering stories about every one of the flowers. My son's logic obeys its own rules, and they are rules that even we who are closest to him cannot understand.

Reason or no, logic or no, it still makes me smile to see his small face screwed up in serious thought - so like his father's expression in the same mood! - as he sorts out his plants.

A sharp kick breaks my reverie, and I press my hand down, rubbing at the spot where the kick landed. Not much longer, I think, as I shift on the chair to try to find a more comfortable position. The huge swell of my belly has dropped lower in the last few days, and something feels different. No, not much longer at all. Soon there will be another little one playing in our garden.

[Open to anyone who wants to play in the garden]

Current Mood: content

hermia-sophia.livejournal.com

Friday, September 19
Hermia and Valmont's apartment

The sun rose, and it was over.

I wove Jack back together, straw by straw and thread by thread, until he was whole, and then hugged him hard for a very long time.

I took Valmont's hand and did not want to let it go for the whole time that we walked through the shattered but healing streets to look for Alice. Dear Alice, herself again and only herself. The three of us walked home together, and tucked Alice into bed. Tomorrow I can talk to her; tomorrow I can help her sort out all of the difficult things that she has seen and felt. Now, I will let her rest.

And now I must help myself sort through all of it, for I still feel half in a dream even though the world has righted itself. The tiny thrill of Power still runs through my fingers, still drums deep in my belly, still ties me to this world and the one beyond.

Still ties me to Nanshe.

She is gone now - I could feel when Syl cut the last thread - but she is still with us. We wove her into the world around us, and her essence keeps us safe. Our dreams will be quieter now, and the abbey will be silent, but the world is whole.

And now…what?

Alice is in bed. I have washed the sand and dirt and salt water off of me, changed my clothes, and…now what? I sit in our living room - our living room, not the strange dark place it was when we left - and I curl into my corner of the couch, and…

Now what?

[Open to Valmont]

lord-icelus.livejournal.com

Some time, in a place that was and is the abbey, that is in this world and in Dream

She is coming.

I can feel her, that nasty bitch, like a tooth ache or a splinter. She nearly killed me, and I still suffer for it. Partly it was my own fault, for not remembering that silly service gods like her love to throw themselves on their own swords to look after their people. As if we should be in service to them!

I want her to get here. I want to kill her slowly, and lick her bones clean, and then I want to dance as the new king of this little town. A nasty pisspot of a place, it is, but it's better than oblivion, yes. They may not worship me, here, but they'd fear me: and for a god of nightmare, that's really good enough.

She's bringing friends, though. I disliked that last time. And so I conjure up a labyrinth, turning the stone of this abbey into twisting pathways of dead ends and trap doors. She'll lose some along the way. And then I will tear out her heart.

[OPEN]

glass-beddau.livejournal.com

[Wednesday 17th 479Thursday, September 18th (day 480)]
[The Abbey]
[In a late strange time]

The air is cool, and still, and waiting to burn.

The graveyard here is different to what it was a day ago; it's the one I've dreamt of, I think, where and a year and more ago I saw Nanshe come walking from the north; graveyard north, not town north. But the ground seethes like bothered ants, and the grass does not whisper. If I left off on looking, I think it would pull itself free and crawl away.

And I leave off looking, as that is not where we are going.

You feel no especial call to goodness, do you, Glass? No. It's not in me, not rooted; but I have come to hate the other, and what it works, and may be that is a beginning.

The Abbey's stone is weeping, and there are shapes even I cannot see in the shadows. This is not the Shuck's night; this is safety twisted to fear. And we have come.

[Open]

Current Mood: angry

hermia-sophia.livejournal.com

Morning, Wednesday September 17
Valmont and Hermia's apartment

Something is not right.

I feel it as soon as I wake up. Something…off. Like a note being played out of tune, over and over, jangling against the edges of my mind.

And then I step out of bed, and do not touch the ground.

I'm floating.

I sit swiftly back down on the bed before I fall - and, yes, I sit on the bed. That works. All right, now back out…one foot, and then the other…

…and I float again. Just a few inches above the ground, but most definitely floating.

Nothing else in the room is floating. Valmont is still there in the bed - and thank all the gods that he's all right! And Nestor is curled up in his corner, flailing away in some strange kitten-dream, but there and safe.

Chester, I think, sending out the signal as my fingers worry at the gold band on my wrist. Something is wrong.

I fall back onto the bed and reach over to shake Valmont's shoulder. "Darling," I whisper urgently. "Wake up."

[Open to Valmont first, then Glass, Chester, and anyone else in the vicinity of the Whitechapel]

Current Mood: anxious

hermia-sophia.livejournal.com

[Saturday, August 16, morning]
[Hermia and Valmont's apartment]

I thought I was careful.

No, I was careful! I always am! I count, and I have all the herbs measured out exactly, and I never forget to take them. There is too much work to be done, and too many other things to worry about. After we have made the blue city come into being, and chased the red city away - then I can stop taking the herbs, and start planning for the far future. For now I must concentrate on magic, and on fighting!

Or, that's what I thought.

At first I thought that I had counted incorrectly, or marked the wrong day on my calendar. But then the days passed and my monthly bleeding still did not come.

And then three days ago, there was that horrible burst of Power, and the dead birds. Chester and I are still trying to puzzle it out. Perhaps now that the Power was released, my body would return to its normal rhythms?

Except that it did not. I checked my calendar again and again, and still once more. The more I checked, and the more I considered, the more I started to think that...perhaps I did not miscount?

Yesterday I tried to go to Lucien's office on the way home from the library, but he was not there - odd, that he wasn't; I hope he's all right. Glass wasn't in either. I have tried to think of who else would know about such things - perhaps that woman from the carnival that people have spoken about? Or, well, there is Syl, but she would hardly welcome me!

And the more that I have thought about it, the more I want to talk to Valmont. Yes, Lucien or Glass or the carnival midwife could confirm it and give me details, and of course I want that and need that! But Valmont is the one I talk to when I am anxious or happy or excited or uncertain, and I am all of those right now. And the more I think about it, the more I want him to be the first person that I speak to about it.

I sit on the bed, hugging my knees to my chest, watching Valmont sleep, waiting for him to wake while my heart flutters with nerves.

What am I doing? What am I thinking? Yes, I have battles to fight, and there is Excolo to save. But who will live in the Excolo that we make, if not the children who will come after us? What better way is there to say that I believe what we are fighting for, if not to show that I have faith that the world will still be here nine months from now, and to try to make that world better?

Well, not nine months. More like seven and a half, if I have counted correctly.

Dear gods, seven and a half months!

Dear gods, when will Valmont wake up?

[Open to Valmont]

Current Mood: nervous

docconstantine.livejournal.com

Sunday, July 18th, late afternoon
The Doctor's office

It was one of those rare and quiet days. Cool enough to enjoy the breeze, grey enough where I am not squinting against the sun, and just calm enough where I could prop my feet up on my desk, lean back in my chair, and catch a quick nap.

It WAS one of those days, at any rate.

Then the Addison boys tumbled in the door, carrying little Henry Rollins, who was howling to high heaven. We were playing capture the flag, and Henry climbed a tree, and we had ta knock him outta it, but he fell funny and his mom's gonna kill us!!!

I groan, for I can already see that the arm is broken. I take the whimpering child from the older boys and carry him into my exam room. It's the resetting that's going to be the most traumatic. I set him down on the table and stroke his hair a bit and wipe the tears from his eyes.

"Hey Henry. Had a fall, huh?" He just sniffles and nods, eyes wide and rather pale. "Okay, I'm gonna take a look at your arm, then we're going to wrap it up real good so it's safe, okay." I'm going to need the boys to fetch Mrs. Rollins, but I'm hoping to get him calm enough to snap it back into place quick. Some mother's have no problwm with such procedures, other's faint.

Very gently, I run my fingers over his arm, feeling for the break. There, right there. Feels clean, and I close my eyes for just a moment, tracing my finger's over the spot, as if willing the bone to snap back to where it should be...

There's an intake of breath and whispering behind me, and Henry's arm feels so warm. I open my eyes, and his arm is warm, almost alight with it under my hand. I am not sure what's going on, but I am pretty sure I just coaxed the bone back into place. Without knowing how, I can feel it knitting itself back together, I can feel the pain ebbing away from the boy...

I suddenly feel woozy and quite chilly, and I hold up my hand looking at it. I am barely aware that Henry is waving his arm about and saying something about it being all better, and I hardly register the boys running out and the yells of "thanks doc!!!" as they scamper away.

I slump to the floor, still staring at my hand.

"What the HELL.....?"

(open)

Current Mood: shocked

docconstantine.livejournal.com

Current Mood: shocked

kira-galliard.livejournal.com

{Early Evening- Tuesday, 29th June ~ Day 394}
{Crossroads DanceHall}

Tonight I'm gonna have myself a real good time
I feel alive
And the world turning inside out, yeah
And floating around in ecstasy, so
Don't stop me now
Don't stop me
'Cuz I'm having a good time, having a good time

It is finally time to open the doors.
The lights are on- thanks to a couple folks from the fair who came out to help me with 'em. And the musics' done warming up now- sounds of instruments tuning and and the player's psyching each other up have given over to songs playing and feet stomping along.
A few brave souls have opened the dancing and there are mostly smiles all around.

So far so good.

A lot of the younger set know me by now from hiring them for the clean-up, and I put up some signs around town, so hopefully we'll have a good turn out.
And now that the greater part of the haying is done, people are in a good mood. People like to dance and come out and see each other when they're happy. Even in a strange town like this that holds true.

Smooth my skirt as I circle the floor towards the drink stand. I'll probably take a few turns of my own tonight, but mostly my job is to meet people who don't know me yet and get them to like me enough to come back. If the night continues like this, I do think it'll turn out fine.

The band starts another song, and I find my smile is genuine.

(The DanceHall is open to all! Come on in and have fun!)

tereixa-zann.livejournal.com

[Early morning of Sunday, June 27 (day 392)]
[Out in the park]

I smell like beer. Which, since it's oh-god-early on a Sunday morning, sometime between breakfast and church, would be kinda embarrassing if I'd been drinking.

Yesterday was such a soup that I ended up going to bed early (well, early for a Saturday); woke up in the quiet time before dawn and lay awake for a bit watching the wall. There's a blank spot where the blueprint Kent gave me used to be, I used it in the music box, and now Genny's shades-of-grey sketch of my Carousel and the perfect crisp black-on-white Soon. from Management are flanking empty space. Can't really make them out in the dark, but I know they're there.

So I got up and went out and went for a walk,

I went to the Miskatonic because hey--jukebox, how can you go wrong with a jukebox? It helped, it really did. So I was sitting down with coffee to listen to the music when I saw Cain and someone I didn't place heading up the street and not dawdling at all, so I went out to see where they were going and, well, the Abbey is not an unfriendly place so I figured I'd stop by and ask what was going on, or more specifically what broke.

I don't have a lot of experience working with brewing equipment (and there's a faint flicker of guilt, remembering Tez), but a ball valve is a ball valve, right? And cracks and leaks are pretty much the same all over.

So we got the distillery patched up and then cleaned up, and they were nice enough to spot breakfast, and I've got that tired content feeling you get after a good long job. Nice to know I can still improvise, if I need to, even with everything that's changed--and if I can't get what needs fixing, I can still fix.

I'll head home in a bit, but right now I'm just killing a moment in the park. My stomach's full and the tea's keeping me awake and life? Life is honestly feeling pretty good right now. Light a cigarette and stretch out my feet and watch the world go by, and I'm grinning, I can feel it.

~~[Open]~~
[Closed]

Current Mood: cheerful

tereixa-zann.livejournal.com

Current Mood: cheerful

valmont-vicomte.livejournal.com

Saturday, June 19th

Today dawns as bright as one could hope for one's birthday, though the air is heavy, but by the afternoon it is raining, sun prisming through water.

It is the first birthday Marie has missed, and the sixteenth. Today I seem to be seeing double, memories of the past splintering as brightly as sunlight gleaming through raindrops. The real past, and the one that never was, both of them pregnant with meaning.

I am thirty-three years old, and last year I drank with my friends and took Kaeli to bed, all laughter and kisses and then lovemaking of surprising intensity, and across the town Kora lay bleeding to death on the floor of the sheriff's office while Hermia held Maryk together. And in another world I celebrated my twenty-first birthday so hard that I vomited in Kaeli's bedroom after she took me home, and fell asleep on her bed fully dressed. In this world, a year ago tomorrow I ran to the sheriff's office to find out what had happened to Kora, and Hermia met my questions with a gentle strength I had not expected, and I think even then I started to fall in love with her, over hot coffee, watching her hands flutter as she grew passionate over philosophy and feeling. And in a world that never was Marie brought me coffee for my hangover, and told me about Kora, who I'd never known, and I cradled the cup in my hands as I sat on the sofa and thought dimly about how fragile bodies seemed, before curling up under a blanket and sleeping the afternoon away.

I am not so very sad; only thoughtful, and not disposed as I was last year to throw a party. Tonight I want my family around me, and that is enough. The man I was a year ago would have been shocked; but the man I was then was on the very cusp of change, and he did not know it. And all things measured, I am, for the most part, glad.

[closed]

valmont-vicomte.livejournal.com

samuel-durand.livejournal.com

Sunday, June 13
The Whitechapel, Front Desk

Sometimes it seems that I've spent half my life traveling under the open sky, sleeping under trees, in rocky overhangs, in clefts gouged from the rocky ground with the heel of a boot. It's always an adjustment, coming back to civilization, and the lack of continuity from settlement to settlement doesn't help matters much. Some places have running water and clean sheets. Others... well, let's just say that dysentery might actually be the least of your worries.

Still, I'm guardedly happy for the chance to sleep in an actual bed again. Weakness of the flesh, I know. Even the availability of luxury has a tendency to erode discipline, though I've generally found the benefits of the occasional indulgence to be worth the cost.

I deserve it. I haven't lost my focus in a decade and a half.

When I tie Memory out front of the Whitechapel, I leave her mouth no more than three inches from the rail. After a moment's thought, I hobble her as well. I'd bloody blindfold her too, but she tends not to take it well. "There, there, girl," I murmur, rubbing her ear. She snorts and rolls her dark eyes at me, but it's all she can do. "Be good."

I make my way into the building, adjusting my habit as I go. "Hello?"

(Open)

Current Mood: tired

samuel-durand.livejournal.com

Sunday, June 13
The Whitechapel, Front Desk

I deserve it. I haven't lost my focus in a decade and a half.

I make my way into the building, adjusting my habit as I go. "Hello?"

(Open)

Current Mood: tired

jaeresteade.livejournal.com

Monday, May 31
Day 365(!), early afternoon
Out and about on Silk Road

I rolled over this morning to find the bed beside me still warm and Ri pulling her clothes back on and gathering her things. Managed to wake up enough to ask her if she wanted me to walk her home, but she said she’d manage. I would have been glad to do it, too, but I do like my sleep. And she did kiss me before she slipped out.

The raw, inked skin over my heart pulled as I settled back in bed, and everything underneath it pulled as well. I’m doing my best to love the girl, and I guess it's not going too badly if she wants to see me two nights in three. Not doing too badly at anything these days, with my hand healed and both jobs going well. The only thing I’m having a hard time getting out of my head is what the hell I’m going to do about Verdi.

I can’t help walking past the Tavern most days, and so many of them I’ve come close to putting my head in the door. Can’t think she wouldn’t be happy to see me, at least at first, but then what? How the hell do you start talking about blood and lies with someone like her when you’ve got, well, whatever’s between us? Just can’t see how to manage it, or how it could ever come out well in the end.

Most of a month this has been festering in my head. Just can’t put it away. Guess I could maybe run some errands, get something to eat, and then maybe, maybe see if I can’t talk to her. And if it’s the last thing I do, well, at least I don’t have to work tonight.

OPEN

Current Mood: aggravated

jaeresteade.livejournal.com

Current Mood: aggravated

jaeresteade.livejournal.com

Saturday night
May 22nd, Day 356
Whitechapel Bar

Heard they were busy here last night, even with the rain yesterday, and I wish I’d been working, if only for the tips. We did all right at the ‘Boy, but Friday nights have just been steady lately. I guess another day of rain must have been too much for everyone, though. People were sparse at the market today, and I don’t know if I’ve ever seen it so slow here on a weekend.

I gave up trying to talk to Adam about half an hour after we opened. He’s pissed, and I don’t blame him. It’s not going to be a good night for either of us. I’ve got enough on my mind, though. So many strange stories going around about people getting things they’d wanted or having things done to them that turned out to be what someone else had wished on them. I wish I could go talk to Verdi about it, but I’m not up to facing her quite yet.

Just really happy about things with Ri, the way she smiles when she sees me and looks happy to have me around. Haven’t managed to get her to come over yet, but I’m not going to push. I found a necklace at the market that I think she’ll like. Not at all sure, though, and I keep putting my hand in my pocket to play with it. Not used to spending money on things without any use, but I’m going to have to tell her soon about what happened with Danika, and maybe a gift will make her feel more like forgiving me for being an idiot one more time. Not sure about that, either.

~~OPEN~~
CLOSED

Current Mood: pensive

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EXCOLO

Est Deus In Nobis

Entries tagged with valmont

but then there was a star danced, and under that I was born

(no subject)

for present comfort and for future good

I have been troubled in my sleep this night, But dawning day new comfort hath inspired.

Life is a maze in which we take the wrong turn before we have learnt to walk.

This is where dreams — dreams, do you understand — come to life, come real. Not daydreams: dreams.

what dreams may come

You should live twice; in it and in my rhyme

So to explain it in layman's terms; "I have no freakin' idea what's going on!"

So to explain it in layman's terms; "I have no freakin' idea what's going on!"

(no subject)

For what human ill does not dawn seem to be an alleviation?

For what human ill does not dawn seem to be an alleviation?

Now we are thirty-three

Now we are thirty-three

Keeping open weary eyes

Keeping open weary eyes

Delay is the deadliest form of denial.

Delay is the deadliest form of denial.

Thank Heaven, the sun has gone in, and I don't have to go out and enjoy it.

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